Newspaper Article - Title: Losing interest in EBay

[Nat]

There is a show I watch on tv with a fellow named Steve Dotto about computers, software, internet.  I was searching the net for his site, I queried his name and stumbled across an article he wrote for a newspaper...

Title: Losing interest in EBay

Where did the EBay I loved go?
Someone hijacked the neat community and replaced it with a superstore.
I was a hard-core EBay nut. I loved the voyage of discovery that EBay offered. Each week I found new gems to admire, or perhaps even purchase. Fulfilling success was found when I sold my first item, got paid and pocketed the proceeds.
I would check out what was new on EBay everyday, like so many others. We honed our sniping skills, learning to monitor a bargain we had "discovered," lurking in the weeds, a bid and backup bid pre-entered on our computer to be submitted just as the auction clock ticked to zero. There was pure joy in swooping in to snatch the deal from under the nose of the poor chump who placed early bids and then thought that they had won, only to be trumped by our superior strategy.

Sadly, for me the music is gone. No more jig dancing. EBay has outgrown me. Where there was once a community now sits a corporate presence. Where people used to sell this and that out of their basement and garages, massive resellers now list thousands of items. You can barely find individuals selling on EBay anymore; all the sellers are stores. They have lost the fun, the innocence, the community, the essence of what EBay had been.

full story here:
http://www.nsnews.com/issues06/w040206/0...06ho4.html

I was fascinated with the article because you mean I'm not the only one feeling like this about eBay?

[maggie777]

now list thousands of items. You can barely find individuals selling on EBay anymore; all the sellers are stores. They have lost the fun, the innocence, the community, the essence of what EBay had been.

I miss the early years when it was fun but I wouldn't have a business if it hadn't changed.

The day it became a business for me and I started paying Ebay thousands in fees every month is when it stopped being fun for me as a seller.  It stopped being fun for me as a buyer when the sellers became businesses.  I contributed to the destruction of the old community.  :-[

I've visited the site once or twice since I stopped selling there in January but I left empty handed. The whole place is so generic now.

[Kristijntje]

Another one who feels like you two about the "new eBay"

Shopping-mall feel taking away from eBay's quaint appeal

Is it just me, or have you noticed that eBay has changed?

It was once the world's greatest garage sale. If you wanted a hubcap for a 1952 Buick, it was there. If you were looking for a specific piece of Depression glass, it was there. Somebody somewhere was cleaning out their stuff and you didn't have to drive to Biloxi, Miss., to find it. It was great.

That hubcap and the Depression glass are still there, but it's no longer sold by some guy cleaning out his garage or attic. That's because eBay has become the world's largest shopping mall. It seems like every time I look for something, it's being sold by an eBay merchant or store...

I find myself looking on Craigslist.org more and more these days instead of eBay....

eBay still has an important role in rescuing one man's junk to become another man's treasure. But like so many things, it's become big business. I just miss eBay's good old days.

full article: http://www.azcentral.com/arizonarepublic...n0508.html